The Washington Post is one of the few publications in the decadent US capitalist media that believes that a proposed US law, sponsored no less by the so-called vice president, calling for and authorizing torture of citizens of other countries by Americans is even newsworthy and deserves comment in the mainstream of the jaded US bourgeois media. But if anyone blows the cover of a single US spy, the two-faced US capitalist media will drop its nonchalance and come down on you like a ton of bricks.

If the GOP-controlled US legislature passes the law that authorizes torture and human rights abuses of foreign prisoners or detainees or whatever the US capitalist press, at any given time, calls them, the Bush regime, the executive branch, can argue "You see? The American people support torture because the majority of the lawmakers they elected support torture. You see?

By implicitly supporting torture, the American people show that they are worthless as the GOPs, for otherwise, the American people would strongly oppose torture whoever were the victims of torture ... even if the victims were only "foreign prisoners." And a worthless people don't deserve the fair elections, the rule of law, and democracy. You see? We, the GOPs who rule here, took all of the things -- fair elections, the rule of law, and democracy -- away from the American people. Now, what'cha got to say about that?"

The reactionary and pro-imperialist sector of German people in the 1930s dug their own graves, like their counterparts in the United States today, when they looked the other way while Hitler and Himmler (today, Bush and Cheney) tortured "foreign prisoners." Fortunately, a majority of the Americans still favor fair elections, the rule of law, justice, and democracy, despite the existence of the Bush dictatorship which imposes its will on the people of the United States without regard to electoral results or to the law.

The Bush dictatorship, among other things, skillfully manipulates the US capitalist media, which dominates the attention and interests and political nomenclature of the mass of the US people, to impose its arbitrary will on the people of the United States contrary to the rule of law.

"His position [Cheney's] is not just some abstract defense of presidential power. The CIA is holding an unknown number of prisoners in secret detention centers abroad. In violation of the Geneva Conventions, it has refused to register those detainees with the International Red Cross or to allow visits by its inspectors. Its prisoners have "disappeared," like the victims of some dictatorships," the Washington Post said in the October 26 editorial.

So, "its prisoners have 'disappeared,' like the victims of some dictatorships." Is the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which is so down on Cuba, concerned about these US crimes? Oh, no!

Is the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights concerned about these US crimes? Not in the least.

Is the sanctimonious Human Rights Watch (which is so down on Venezuela), concerned about these US crimes? Don't be silly, you know it ain't.

And what about our grand Organization of American States which makes such a fuss about its precious Democratic Charter, is it concerned? The OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza lets Condoleezza Rice write his speeches from which he never deviates.

So, not all dictatorships do evil things like this, only some dictatorships, perhaps the worse ones, like the GOP dictatorship in Washington, D.C.These human right commissions and organizations are not concerned about the deliberate and concerted US campaign ... now spreading "openly" from the executive to the legislative branch of the American government ... to destroy human rights on a worldwide basis because money from the United States government corrupts these harlot commissions and gigolo organizations into silence and complicity.

But these GOPs and their proxies who "openly" advocate torture also want to visit Havana and Caracas, as dignitaries, to sermonize or to "hold court" about human rights, the rule of law, and democracy while they help to cover up the colossal atrocities against humanity committed by US imperialism.

One worries about the motive of the Washington Post when it writes in the October 26 editorial "Official investigations have indicated that some aberrant practices by Army personnel in Iraq originated with the CIA. Yet no CIA personnel have been held accountable for this record, and there has never been a public report on the agency's performance." There are about 12 major US concentration camps in Iraq. World attention has been focused mostly on the US concentration camps in and near the capital Baghdad. The torture that has occurred and still occurs in the US concentration camps is not in any way or to any degree "aberrant," in the sense of deviating from what is common, because torture is common at all US concentrations camps in Iraq.

If Cheney gets his law which says, in so many words "Boys, torture 'em real good," torture will only become more common and not in the least "aberrant."

There is no truth in the claim of the Washington Post that the "aberrant practices by Army personnel in Iraq originated with the CIA." The so-called "aberrant practices" originated in the White Houses when the then White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales asked, in late 2001, the Justice Department to prepare a legal memo on the legality of torture and murder if ordered by the commander in chief.

The Justice Department referred the task to its Office of Legal Counsel which found that such torture and murders are legal. The memo was distributed in the White House, evoking orgasmic outbursts and screams from Alberto Gonzales who was promptly titled "the architect of the [Bush's] administration unlawful torture policy," the then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, and the "vice president or president of vice" Cheney.

The Justice Department memo in favor of torture was also distributed within the US Department of Defense where the Secretary Rumsfeld, the Deputy Secretary Wolfowitz, and the General Counsel of Defense Department (who participated in the preparation of the memo) were publicly grateful and joyful for the authority to torture.

Another reason why the so-called "aberrant practices" did not originate with the CIA is that most of the interrogation of prisoners was contracted out by the Defense Department, not by the CIA, to firms that relied on Israelis mercenaries. Clearly, the CIA was involved in the early torture in Iraq, but more as an agent than as a principal.

Finally, the Washington Post scored big when it wrote in grand form: "It's not surprising that Mr. Cheney would be at the forefront of an attempt to ratify and legalize this shameful record. The vice president has been a prime mover behind the Bush administration's decision to violate the Geneva Conventions and the UN Convention Against Torture and to break with decades of past practice by the US military. These decisions at the top have led to hundreds of documented cases of abuse, torture and homicide in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr. Cheney's counsel, David S. Addington, was reportedly one of the principal authors of a legal memo justifying the torture of suspects. This summer Mr. Cheney told several Republican senators that President Bush would veto the annual defense spending bill if it contained language prohibiting the use of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment by any US personnel."

Nobody has spoken better about the political and moral corruption of the United States under the Bush regime or, more correctly, the Cheney regime than the Washington Post.

Once again, does the term "any US personnel," in the quote immediately above, imply only CIA personnel as earlier asserted? Of course not.

If nothing else, Cheney's push for a pro-torture bill reveals the modus operandi of the criminality of the Bush regime with regard to the rule of law.

First, the Bush regime does exactly what the law bans. US law and treaties ban torture, so the Bush regime tortures.

Second, after its violations of the US law become public knowledge, the Bush regime demands that the law be changed to permit what is currently banned. Now that torture by the Bush regime has been exposed, the Cheney wants to change the law to permit Americans to torture "foreigners."

Third, whether the law is changed or left unchanged, keep doing what has always been done. Whether Cheney gets his torture law or not, the degenerate Bush regime will continue the torture.